Proximon :
You want to use stuff that doesn't leave anything behind. Mineral spirits and hand sanitizer might, as might vodka. That's just theory of course. No one has tested it.
The thing about the isopropyl alcohol is that it evaporates fast and leaves almost nothing behind. Nothing to interfere with the viscosity of the TIM or react with it in unknown ways.
Petroleum based products will usually not evaporate as fully or as fast, although acetone does evaporate fast (as does other such things, all of which are not normally found in homes). You also should worry about how such products might interact with your motherboard, and the FLAMMABILITY of the residue.
I think I have seen small packs of alcohol wipes in convenience stores, next to the pain relievers.
Isopropyl alcohol may or may not leave water behind. The type bought at a drugstore in a bottle is usually between 70% to 99% alcohol and the rest water. I might use 99% but never use 70%, because most modern computing equipment PCBs have water soluble flux residue on them that can cause damage if water comes in contact with it. It does not necessarily matter if the water dries completely, as the water droplets dry they become smaller and more concentrated pools of flux.
Flux residue is mildly active and leeches metal from component leads, then as this dries it potentially creates a conductive electrical path. This is especially problematic under tight pitch ICs that can trap liquid like CPU, northbridge, GPU, etc... ironically the most common places where heatsink grease would be. You can be rid of this residue with a thorough rinse cycle, but not with only waiting for a small application of water to dry such that the flux wasn't rinsed away.
Silicone oil based greases may need replaced every year or two on very high heat density interfaces, but seldom are these present today as more chips now have heat spreaders on them. These greases are the generic and dirt cheap types, while modern high end synthetic greases should be good for the life of the system.